I sometimes get the sense that Michelle Obama, like Edwin Arlington Robinson’s “Miniver Cheevy,” wishes she had lived at an earlier time so she’d have something genuine to complain about. As reality dictated, she was born a year after Lyndon Johnson signed the 1964 Civil Rights Act. Whether she faced discrimination growing up or not, it is nevertheless interesting that the passage of that law was not an achievement for which she might have experienced pride in her country prior to 2008.

It is also worth noting that in her speech, she said:

[W]hat our parents told us really is true. That if we get our education we can do anything. We can lift up our sights to anything we can imagine. We truly can be builders of a new day.

This idea that somehow we succeed just on our own is just not true. Nobody does, not even the President of the United States — maybe especially not the President of the United States. There are thousands, tens of thousands of people — starting with my parents, and now my family — but tens of thousands — hundreds of thousands of people who helped me succeed and continue to help me succeed every single day.

It was a rehashing of his foolish “You didn’t build that” remark, and it rings as false now as it did then. But if he and the missus are going to dispense advice to young people, maybe they should compare notes beforehand.

Howard Portnoy has written for The Blaze, HotAir, NewsBusters, Weasel Zippers, Conservative Firing Line, RedCounty, and New York’s Daily News. He has one published novel, Hot Rain, (G. P. Putnam’s Sons), and has been a guest on Radio Vice Online with Jim Vicevich, The Alana Burke Show, Smart Life with Dr. Gina, and The George Espenlaub Show.

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